Beer and Malik

This page offers you information about a range of leading minds in the fields of cybernetics, systems theory, computer sciences and information and communications theory, who are not included in the Model of a Reading List from Stafford Beer's book The Heart of Enterprise. The majority of them are representatives of systems thinking and transdisciplinarity, though in some individual cases their work does not have a direct connection. However, it is characterized by a systems approach and cybernetic thinking.

Anyone who sets off on a journey through the links that we recommend will inevitably find themselves in a complex series of networks and cycles. Most of the people involved form a strong but often only informal network.

We recommend that you visit the cyberneticists' sites first, in particular if you believe you have a startling new thought, or if you think you are on the track of an ingenious solution. If someone else has long since asked the questions that most people are not accustomed to think of, then you are fairly likely to find out about them from these leading thinkers. The list is in alphabetical order. It makes no claim to be complete, because particularly in cybernetics every ending is also a beginning...

The links listed below will take you to independent Websites run by other operators.
The Cwarel Isaf Institute takes no responsibility for the operation or the content of these Websites

Julian Bigelow
Engineer, worked in the early days with Norbert Wiener and John von Neumann;
later a computer scientist at IBM.

Websites:
pespmc1.vub.ac.be
www.macmillanonline.net
www.ruhr-uni-bochum.de

Kenneth E. Boulding
One of the founding fathers of general systems theory

Websites:
www.newciv.org
www.gwu.edu
csf.colorado.edu
www.geocities.com

Valentin Braitenberg

Cyberneticist at the Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics in Tübingen

Websites:
www.kyb.tuebingen.mpg.de/~braitenb
www.kyb.tuebingen.mpg.de/de/about
www.ai.univie.ac.at
www.literaturhaus.at

David Braybrooke

Websites:
www.dal.ca
browse.addall.com
www.la.utexas.edu

Hans-Joachim Bremermann
Pioneer of biomathematics
Discovered the famous "Bremermann's Limit" that forms the computational limit in complex systems. This is the basis of intelligent systems design and of all the cybernetic strategies involved in variety engineering.

Websites:
www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk
pespmc1.vub.ac.be
math.berkeley.edu

Carsten Bresch

Websites:
www.kli.ac.at/theorylab
www.biologie.uni-freiburg.de

Eduardo Renato Caianiello
Neurocyberneticist

Website:
www.iiass.it

Donald T. Campbell
One of the pioneers of evolutionary epistemology

Websites:
www.kli.ac.at
www.iaccp.org.
www.measurementexperts.org

Peter Checkland
Founder of soft systems methodology

Websites:
members.tripod.com
www.sfc.keio.ac.jp

Colin Cherry
Pioneer of communications theory

Websites:
www.aim25.ac.uk
theory.lcs.mit.edu
www.informatik.uni-trier.de
www.comm.cornell.edu

Edward De Bono
One of the most important researchers into creativity. An important cyberneticist in terms of his way of thinking, although he never uses the term. Has published numerous books. His most important publication in this context is "The Mechanism of Mind", 1969

Websites:
www.edwarddebono.com
paedpsych.jk.uni-linz.ac.at
www.methode.de

Peter Drucker

Websites:
www.peter-drucker.com
www.pfdf.org
drucker.cgu.edu

Sir John Carew Eccles
Neurophysiologist and Nobel prize winner.
Co-author with Karl Popper of "The Self and Its Brain".

Websites:
www.nobel.se
www.m-ww.de

John Gall

Websites:
www.simplerwork.com/library/c1.htm.
www.simplerwork.com/library/c25.htm.

Aloys Gälweiler

Peter Gomez

Websites:
idw-online.de

Friedrich A. Hayek
Economist, social theorist, order theorist, Nobel prize winner 1974. Eminent cyberneticist, although not generally known as such. This is evident from one of his later works "Law, Legislation and Liberty", 3 volumes, London 1973 – 1979.

Websites:
http://www.nobel.se
http://www.hayekcenter.org
http://www.hayek.de

Erich Jantsch
Systems philosopher, systems designer, evolution theorist. Applied evolution theory to social systems.
Book: "Design for Evolution".

Websites:
pespmc1.vub.ac.be
www.kli.ac.at
home.t-online.de

Websites:
www.gesellschaft-fuer-kybernetik.org
jerome-segal.de
www.kybernetiknet.de

Walter Krieg
One of the pioneers of St. Gallen systems-oriented management theory. Together with Hans Ulrich created the St. Gallen management model.

Websites:
www.gwu.edu

Charles E. Lindblom

Rolf Lohberg und Theo Lutz
The first authors writing in German to produce a "comprehensible introduction to a modern science". This is the subtitle of their book "Keiner weiss was Kybernetik ist" [No one knows what cybernetics is] that appeared for the first time in 1968 and was reprinted in 1990.

Konrad Lorenz
Behaviorist and evolution theorist.

Websites:
www.kli.ac.at
www.nobel.se
home.datacomm.ch

Websites:
www.asa3.org
theory.lcs.mit.edu

Margaret Mead
Margaret Mead took part from the start in the Macy conferences, where cybernetics was born. It is impossible to imagine the group of cybernetics pioneers without her, although she herself was not a cyberneticist.

Websites:
www.mead2001.org
www.gwu.edu
emuseum.mnsu.edu

Jean Piaget
The most important developmental psychologist of the 20th century.

Websites:
www.unige.ch
www.philosophenlexikon.de/piaget

Walter Pitts
Together with Warren McCulloch wrote "A Logical Calculus of Ideas Immanent in Nervous Activity", a pioneering work in the field of neuronal networks, the theory of automata, information technology and cybernetics.

Websites:
cognet.mit.edu
www.mdx.ac.uk
www.artsci.wustl.edu
cs.uni-muenster.de

Sir Karl R. Popper
Scientific philosopher and founder of critical rationalism.

Websites:
plato.stanford.edu
www.eeng.dcu.ie

Gilbert J. B. Probst

Websites:
hec.info.unige.ch

Rupert Riedl

Websites:
www.kli.ac.at
www.wissenschaft-online.de

Arturo Rosenblueth
Physiologist who worked with Norbert Wiener and Julian Bigelow. One of their joint papers, which appeared in 1943 in "Philosophy of Science", was entitled "Behavior, Purpose and Teleology". This was the first time the term "cybernetics" was used. At around the same time Warren McCulloch and Walter Pitts published their paper "A Logical Calculus of the Ideas Immanent in Nervous Activity" in the "Bulletin of Mathematical Biophysics". The appearance of these two papers in 1943 is considered to represent the birth of cybernetics.

Website:
www.colegionacional.org.mx

Markus Schwaninger

Websites:
www.ifb.unisg.ch
www.newciv.org

Herbert A Simon
Decision theory, complexity theory. Nobel prize for economics.

Websites:
www.nobel.se
www.nobel.se
www.ruebenstrunk.de
www.psy.cmu.edu

John D. Steinbrunner

Website:
www.puaf.umd.edu

Karl Steinbuch

Websites:
xputers.informatik.uni-kl.de
www.informatik.uni-trier.de
www.hu-berlin.de

Hans Ulrich
The father of the St. Gallen management model and pioneer of systems-oriented management theory.

Website:
http://www.ifb.unisg.ch

Frederic Vester
Frederic Vester is the best-known cyberneticist in the German-speaking countries. Originally a biochemist, he has truly unlimited creativity and is a master of the art of didactics. Frederic Vester works closely together with Fredmund Malik. His sensitivity model is used at the St. Gallen Management Center.

www.frederic-vester.de

Heinz von Foerster
Physicist and founder of the legendary Biological Computer Laboratory (BCL) at the University of Illinois. He is one of the most enigmatic pioneers of cybernetics. His books contain the most fascinating descriptions of the growth of the new scientific discipline. The film "90 Jahre Heinz von Foerster - die praktische Bedeutung seiner Arbeiten" [90 years of Heinz von Foerster – the practical significance of his work] is a vivid illustration of the development of cybernetics. He tells the story shortly before his 90th birthday. The film can be obtained from www.mzsg.ch.

Websites:
www.univie.ac.at
www.mzsg.ch
web.library.uiuc.edu
web.library.uiuc.edu
www.ece.uiuc.edu
home.snafu.de

John von Neumann
The father of modern computer architecture, who, together with Oskar Morgenstern, developed game theory, that nowadays, in the form of decision theory, has an influence on a large number of scientific fields, including ethics and economics.

Websites:
ei.cs.vt.edu
www.eingang.org
www-groups.dcs.st-andrews.ac.uk
www.physics.umd.edu/robot/neumann.html
www.google.com/search

Paul Watzlawick
Together with Gregory Bateson described double bind theory and played a leading role in the development of systemic family therapy. Co-author with Janet H. Beavin and Don D. Jackson of the most important principles of communications psychology, on a deeply biological and epistemological basis.
His books on popular science have made a significant contribution to the dissemination and understanding of cybernetic and systemic thinking.

Websites:
www.colorado.edu
www.gwu.edu

Vero C. Wynne-Edwards

Websites:
www.kli.ac.at/theorylab
130.15.161.74/techserv.